She's Slept in my Bed
by Sarsel
Summary: Abbey POV. f/f bit of a crossover with The American President film. Nothing explicit.


We'd never really met each other before. We had seen each other at different functions during the campaign, been part of the same photo ops. We were both required to wear something elegant on inauguration day. The media probably assumed we were friends and didn't care much. After all, our husbands looked almost identical on a fact sheet. Both liberal democrats with illustrious academic backgrounds and similar policy mandates. They were political allies who were married to intelligent, professional women and a picture of the four of us was printed on millions of front pages. Why wouldn't we like each other, or at least know each other?  
  
Because when Andrew Sheppard left the White House and Jed Bartlet was getting ready to move in, I still didn't really believe it was happening. I still had a line engraved separating us from the people surrounding. Even after the years of Jed being governor, I never considered him a politician. He was a patriot, a naive idealist and a jackass as well as a brilliant Nobel laureate. He wanted to improve his country but was someone entirely separate from Leo or Josh or any of the other political people working for him. The label certainly never included me. After the months of campaigning I'd begun to feel twinges of resentment towards the politicians and they've been off and on ever since. My life was eroding, replaced by this campaign and this new form of existence which was controlled by them. Often I didn't mind and participated freely but the line I had drawn never wavered.  
  
She was a politician. Before their marriage or her entitlement as the First Lady, she was one of the very people that I dichotomized myself apart from. On inauguration day I was the supporting wife of a man whose dream had come true and for some terribly naive reason I still didn't recognize how it would change me. That's why I didn't become her friend. It was probably the reason she didn't become mine either. What advice or support could she give to a person who still had no comprehension of what she was getting in to? What did we really have in common that day other than our similar husbands and our different positions on the same path?  
  
I would hardly have referred to her as an acquaintance and I don't think Jed would ever have referred to Andrew Sheppard as a friend, despite the fact that their personalities might have made them best friends. Something I know now is that if anything else, 8 years in this house changes a person and it's changing Jed every day. He becomes a little more comfortable with his power, endures the cumbersome formalities with a little less humility. It's an elite club he's joined and while it will never really change how he acts with his family and closest friends, the life style does not lend itself to a former president and newer one, no matter how friendly politically, to actually form a bond. They have so many common factors, one of which is the idea that it should be lonely at the top.  
  
So Sidney and I never knew each other.  
  
That changed about a year into the second term. We were both at some fund-raising dinner for some kind of issue that we probably had in common. It probably wasn't medical because I was usually speaking at those. Or would they still even be asking me at that point after I'd resigned my licence and broken rules? Maybe it was a women's group thing. I'm guessing here; I really don't remember what the cause was. Why should I or why should she? We were the kind of people who went to those things for free.   
  
We were sitting at different tables. I could see the organizers deliberating over the seating the way Toby and Sam debate small, often mundane uses of language. Can we sit two first ladies together? Are they friends? Are they enemies? 'Strongly encourages' or 'deeply supports'? If they sit apart, which table is the most desirable and who gets it?  
  
I guess that the final decision was made based on the fact that we were the entertainment and should be spread out among the paying guests. People were paying a huge amount of money to a charity for a seat at the party and the pleasure of our company. A lot more milage was possible if we worked apart.  
  
I think it became very clear at this point that Sydney and I had a lot more in common this time.  
  
I'm chatting with a few people whom I know and I'm smiling politely, making the amusing, biting comments that I'm apparently known for. I've often decided that good causes deserve good entertainment and I like doing things well.   
  
I catch her out of the corner of my eye. She's conversing with a group smaller than mine and unlike me, she's not talking but listening intently to the girl next to her.   
  
The sudden thought that occurs to me is that she has slept in my bed, or that maybe I'm sleeping in hers. Literally, the bed in my bedroom in the house that I'm living in was hers for almost five years. Knowing the sense of tradition of that house I doubt the sheets are different. The Barlet administration didn't defeat an incumbent enemy. I imagine if we had then both of the wings would have been sabotaged with missing computer bits and desks locked shut. Perhaps even a Celtic bonfire where we burned all the republican linen.   
  
But we didn't.  
  
So I suspect that we've slept on the same bed, mattress and bedding. I suppose I should either find that though disturbing or comforting but for that first moment I think it erotic. Now where did that one come from Abbey? I have to ask myself with a knowing little smirk. An article about me once said that I always look either amused or angry; that my entire range of emotion and facial expression could be summed up with either amused or angry. I suppose right now I look amused.  
  
Well lets run with amused then shall we.  
  
This was all still very early in the evening and before too much time had passed Sydney and I were subtlety brought together for a photo op.  
  
Forced meetings can so often become uncomfortable and awkward but with cameras aimed at you they are simplified to the extreme. There is no time for small talk; she says hello Dr. Barlet, I say hello Mrs. Wade-Sheppard and we're already turning to smile at the photographers. We should probably be on a first name basis by now but when we first met she called me by my formal title and it stuck. I reciprocated. It was never about being cold or unapproachable because by nature and experience we are neither, but it had a lot to do with pride and professionalism. I'd had my fight regarding my name and she'd hers, adding a hyphen after her marriage and into a campaign. At least my name change had been debated in a hotel room; hers was echoed on network news. We are not the kind of wives you take on the trail in the south. We both know it, we both respect it and we both acknowledge it in our greetings.   
  
I should really stop putting thoughts in her head and assuming she thinks the way I do. We are obviously very separate people. There have been entire magazine spreads and far too many words dedicated to our differences. Physically she's slightly taller than I am with very short hair. Apparently I'm the more attractive but her face is more open, more genuinely happy and several years younger. I'm more charming, but that can't be by much. Cosmo says women want her to be their friend who makes them laugh when a boyfriend dumps them and they want me to be the friend who helps them plot revenge.  
  
I think, not for the first time, that I need to keep better reading material in my lounge on the plane.  
  
I've looked her up and down and for a moment I'm embarrassed. Truthfully I was kind of checking her out, the same bed thought not yet removed from my head. I honestly hope she doesn't think I was looking at her the way Mrs. Hoynes or any number of other women look at me; like an enemy, like competition.  
  
But then would the truth be much better?   
  
I wish that the evening would have yielded time for a conversation of words between us. A space of moments like the thousands I had in college or still have with close friends like Millie and sometimes CJ. Deep sharing more often than not fortified with libation. But this is a public event and in all honesty the old problem of what would we say to each other still looms. Maybe that's why in the place of speech my mind envisions kissing.   
  
I know I've started to blush or something now and I issue a kurt 'Stop it Abbey' to myself. The blushing and giddiness I can hear within myself is so contrary to the competent and mature exterior I present. I must have been so extremely bored with the event to start fantasizing about the other guests but if I didn't get it under control soon then that perfect poise was going to be flawed.  
  
The flashing of the cameras eventually dimmed and we exchanged words on the event and the charity . When the first limits of polite conversation were within sight we were already being guided towards our separate tables. She smiled in a more personal manner then and said something that I still can't quite shake.  
  
"You know Abbey, if you're ever in California and need to have a non-scheduled, non-professional lunch, then get in touch."  
  
I'm not young, I'm not naive and I'm not easily shaken so my response only reveals a portion of my pleasure at her invitation. My smile has all the warmth of sincerity in it.  
  
"I'll definitely take you up on that Sydney. And if we get bored we can use that terrible Cosmo article from 5 years ago as conversation fodder." It's a joke, she smiles appreciatively and we both seem to sigh a bit in relief that we're each what the other thought. 


End file.
